Doctor's Orders
by Inks Inc
Summary: When Ziva falls sick, her already limited patience with all things conventional and medicinal is tested. Enter, the ever present Gibbs. Ziva/Gibbs - Father/Daughter. Completed One-Shot.


Pressing the ice cold water into her clammy hand and dishing out two of the violently red antibiotics, he stood patiently as she threw them down with a wince. Her throat was inflamed beyond measure and the remedy was far from painless. Pushing a limp curl, damp with fevered sweat from her forehead, he settled down in the chair beside his couch and settled in for the long haul. A newspaper was extracted from the floor as he simultaneously fixed the blanket that adorned her legs. She shivered, and he drew the blanket up higher still. A list of doctor's instructions lay on the coffee table, already memorised and being followed with an unyielding rigour. A fiery flush was painted on her cheeks as her fever struggled to break. Sighing, she tossed under the blanket restlessly. "I do not need this. I ought to go for a run. It will clear my head. Lying here is not going to achieve anything other than making me want to scream."

Gibbs arched a brow, scanning the sports section.

"Only place you're running to is the bathroom when you need to get sick, seeing as you're too proud to use a bucket like a regular person. Lay there, be still and try to get some sleep. You'll feel better in the morning." She stared up at the ceiling in mounting, mucus ridden frustration. Everything hurt. Things she didn't even knew she had, hurt. The doctor Gibbs had dragged her kicking and screaming to had been utterly alarmed by the intensity of her temperature and had prescribed a plethora of medication, ordering strict bed rest. She had been horrified. She did not get sick. Sick was for weak. Scowling at her immune system, she attempted to move her legs. They hurt. She stopped. Gibbs lifted his head from behind his paper.

"Stop twitching. Just rest. It's not that difficult."

She tipped her head to the side and glared at a grinning picture of some baseball player holding an overlarge trophy. "Yes," she drawled, "Because you are the authority on _rest._ The rumour is you've even taken up Pilates." Smirking behind his paper, Gibbs chuckled. "Well, I do have a very lithe physique. I could do Pilates. Maybe not the clothes, but the thing itself, sure." She frowned. He wasn't rising to her bait and therefore she was never going to get off her infernal back. Then again, that hurt too. Sighing, she blinked up at ceiling for another moment. "You do not have to babysit me," she eventually burst. "I can easily convalesce like a sixty year old ancient person at _my_ apartment. I do not need to be under house arrest in _your_ house, nor do you need to stand guard!" He set down his paper and peered serenely down at her.

"You think someone in their sixties is ancient?"

She baulked. "No no, of course not. One only reaches ones prime in their sixties. But, my point is still valid. There is simply no need for this nonsense. I will rest better in my own bed, in my own home and without a seated watchman. Don't you think?" Shaking his head, Gibbs retrieved his paper. "No. I do not think. I think, on the contrary, that if I let you out of my sight you would throw your meds in the trash and somehow try and _fight_ your way into recovery. We're doing this my way and my way would go a lot easier for you if you would close your eyes and get some sleep." He cleared his throat and muttered under his breath.

"Besides, you can't whine if you're asleep."

The kick to his knee was pathetic and he laughed in response. "I heard that," she snapped. "I do _not_ whine. I am a trained assassin and trained assassins do not whine." She reached over and slapped the paper out of his hand, further irritated by his expression of totally amused benevolence. "They _assassinate."_ Quirking a brow, he retrieved his paper once more and nodded patronisingly, stirringly. "Of course they do. But they don't assassinate when they can't even lift their heads up, because they allowed themselves to run a fever high enough to melt their brains before being forced to seek medical help."

"I will have you killed. I will call in a favour. It will be slow and painful."

He laughed and reached out to pull the blanket back over her knees. "I look forward to it. Now for the last time, would you please give me a break and go to sleep? You get very…spurious, when you're tired." It was her turn to raise a brow. "Spurious? You have been spending far too much time around Ducky." He nodded. "I know. Now go to sleep." She sighed then, knowing when a battle was won and when it was lost. Sinking back on her pillow and feeling like death warmed up, she reluctantly closed her eyes and stared at the dark curtains of her eyelids. Her breathing became a little deeper, and before long, she was drifting. Light sleep descended before being replaced by a deep, medicated sleep. An hour passed, two hours passed and Gibbs read beside her peaceably, leaving only to grab some water and replace hers in case she woke up.

Just as he was settling into the new book he'd reefed out from storage, she screamed.

Startled, he leapt up and threw the book down. She was still asleep, but she was screaming. His heart quickened in panic before he sternly told it to calm the hell down. It was a nightmare. It was clearly a nightmare, and a bad one. He stared hesitantly, unsure on how to proceed. But when she twisted and turned violently, her face screwed up in fear he acted on sheer impulse. Pulling back the blanket, he reached down and gently lifted her up from the sprawled posture so he could sit on the sofa too. Drawing her into his arms and holding her tight, murmuring gently, he was rewarded when her eyes flew open and her screams abruptly subsided. He could feel her heart hammering and drew her closer, pressing a kiss atop her wild mop of curls.

"Easy, easy. It was just a nightmare. It was a possible side effect of one of the meds. I got you, its ok."

She breathed deeply against him, her shoulders shuddering with the effort. Carding a hand through her hair he smiled reassuringly down at her as she looked up at him, the panic fading from her face. "It was so real," she whispered, "I was…back, there. I was back there." Knowing she could say no more than that and feeling the stab in his gut that always wrenched when one of the four was in pain, he nodded. "It's ok. Look around you, look where you are. You're not there. You're a million miles away." She nodded, casting an uncharacteristically unsure eye around his very familiar living room, breathing out the remainder of her panic. She suddenly glared up at him, his insistences on conventional doctoring methods being even more egregious in that moment. " _Now_ can I go and fight my way into recovery?" He grinned, and pressed another kiss on top of her head. "Nope." She growled then, leaning against him sleepily. "Is it time for those disgusting tasting ones now?"

He grinned down at her.

"No. You took those already. I ground them up in your water before you fell asleep."

She glared.

"You _dosed_ me?" He shrugged down at her, utterly unrepentant, with a bemused twinkle in his eyes. "I've always wanted to medicate one of you into silence. It was a beautiful moment. I'm planning on keeping some on the side and throwing it into DiNozzo's coffee tomorrow. That'll be two of the worst pains in my ass out of action for another day. I might even be able to hear myself think for the first time in five years. Sounds a plan, right?"

His surprised yelp as she elbowed him sharply into the ribs echoed around the entire house.

She smiled sweetly up at him and shrugged with a sudden, if fatigued, mischief in her eyes.

"Just so you know, I _do_ think people in their sixties are ancient. Perhaps it is you who should lie down?"

….

A/N: Random One-Shot

….


End file.
